The new trailer for Ben Shapiro and Gina Carano’s film collab has violence, no Holocaust comparisons
Gina Carano stars as Hattie McAllister, her first major role since Disney and Lucasfilm ended their collaboration with her. Photo by Getty/Amy Sussman/Stringer
By PJ Grisar June 3, 2022
Remember last year, when actor Gina Carano shared a meme on social media insinuating that conservatives were being treated like Jews in Nazi Germany, Disney fired her from “The Mandalorian” and pundit Ben Shapiro offered her a starring role in a Daily Wire production? There’s a trailer for that movie now.
Called “Terror on the Prairie,” the film seems to be about a homesteader (Carano) in Montana fending off a violent posse looking for her husband. It looks violent and freighted with religious wrath and could be read as a kind of early 20th-century defense of the Second Amendment. It also, for some reason, co-stars Gabriel-Kane Day-Lewis, the son of Daniel Day-Lewis, which seems to me to prove that even nepotism has its limits.
The trailer is unremarkable, but the circumstances behind it made me wince at the tagline: “There’s nothing more powerful than the will to survive.” It’s an anodyne enough message, but seeing it I can’t help but recall Carano’s horribly botched apology.
Speaking with Shapiro shortly after she was sacked, the former MMA star insisted that the post she made was inspired by her fighting spirit. But on the subject of survival and the Holocaust, Carano said that she was “inspired by, like, the gentle spirit of the Jewish people going through that time.”
Unsurprisingly, but disappointingly, Shapiro, an Orthodox Jew who prides himself on his talent for debate, did nothing to push back on Carano’s offensive remark, which neglects Jewish resistance, both spiritual and armed.
“Terror on the Prairie” appears to dabble in both faith and firearms while maintaining a morally simplistic view of how to survive adversity. Let’s hope it doesn’t contain any misguided Holocaust comparisons.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and the protests on college campuses.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
